David, > So say I open an image with a color profile, and then load a > second image with a different profile. If I now decide to do the > above, what do we do to the first image? how about attaching a profile to each image? Correction is then done using the individual image's profile and the application-wide monitor profile. This gives you a lot of flexibility in the use of different profiles and saves you from having to switch the workspace profile back and forth. >From my own research on the matter, the way it is done in most apps and CMS workflows seems to use three profile settings: 1. a monitor profile 2. a default image profile 3. a working space profile The meaning of the monitor profile is obvious. The default image profile is assigned to images that don't have an embedded profile. The working space profile is a kind of preferred colour space, such as the in-house space of a studio. The workflow is then as follows: When an image is opened, it is assigned its embedded profile, or, if there is none, the default image profile. The assigned profile is then compared to the workspace profile. If they are identical, nothing happens, since the image already is in the user's working space. Otherwise, the user is notified of the fact that the image profile differs from the working space profile and is asked whether she would like to convert the image to the working space or to maintain its original profile. For ease of use there should be a preference setting that defines a default for this dialog and allows it not to be displayed (e.g. "always convert images to working space"). Display correction is then done based on the profile that was assigned to the image (which could be the embedded profile, the default image profile, or, if the image was converted, the workspace profile). Here the working space is more of a preference setting, a colourspace that the user prefers to work in. It is not necessarily used in the display correction (only if it is made the image's profile). In addition there are usually functions to assign a different profile to an image (only changes the attached profile, but doesn't manipulate the image data) or to convert an image to a different profile (changes the profile and the image data). Hope this is of any use Stef an
